The Crypto Community is alive and well — insights from BTC Miami 2019

Last week, Metal representatives attended The North American Bitcoin Conference in Miami. It was a great opportunity to network with other crypto innovators and influencers who share Metal’s vision for mass adoption.

The vibe at this year’s conference was much more relaxed than last year, with attendees and exhibitors alike focused on sharing updates on the products and infrastructure services they are building. We had a great time and wanted to share with you all a few insights from the speakers and some new projects we heard about:

A method to the madness

Dr. Patrick Byrne, CEO of Overstock.com and founder of tZero, a blockchain securities trading platform, gave a talk about the investments he’s been making in the crypto space. He walked listeners through his vision for investing in projects that make crypto more accessible and help it live up to the vision of true peer-to-peer transactions that eliminate middlemen and improve commerce. We’ve been fans of Overstock.com and Dr. Byrne ever since they became the first business with more than $1 million in revenue to accept bitcoin as a payment method.

Run Jason Run

Jason King, founder of the blockchain developer academy Kingsland University, announced he will once again run more than 3,000 miles from Miami to California to raise awareness of bitcoin and celebrate cryptocurrencies. In 2014, King ran from Miami to San Francisco, raising bitcoin to fight homelessness. The details aren’t all set in stone, but we’re excited to see where Jason’s run will take him this year.

Cool Wallet

We hung out with representatives from Cool Wallet and got to test out their hardware wallet in person. We have to say, the product lives up to the name! We loved the bluetooth connection, the unique shape of the wallet (like a hefty credit card), and the way you can easily add tokens by scanning a QR code.

Crypto-friendly banks

One big topic of discussion was about barriers to mainstream adoption of crypto for both consumers and enterprises. One huge barrier has been traditional banks: reports have come out of bank customers getting their accounts closed after investing in cryptocurrency because the banks deem their accounts too risky. But the good news is, we will eventually roll out our own banking services, so you won't have to worry about that. Yes, that includes all the features you'd expect: debit cards, check writing, check depositing, and more!

Until next time

The conference was well run, as always, and it was a great chance to talk to more crypto enthusiasts about Metal Pay. Now that some of the hype has settled down around crypto, we highly recommend attending conferences like this one, even if you’re brand new to crypto. It’s a great time to get involved!